After Baldwin was removed from an AA flight shortly before take-off – he claims because he was playing mobile game Words With Friends, while other reports suggest he was talking on his phone and wouldn’t shut off the device in accordance with safety regulations – he took to Twitter to blast the airline and promote rival carrier United.
Baldwin even appeared to insult AA’s flight attendants, writing that they are all “retired Catholic school gym teachers from the 1950’s”.
In response, AA said that an unnamed passenger had been “extremely rude to the crew, calling them inappropriate names and using offensive language”. It added that the same passenger had taken his phone into the lavatory and slammed the door after being asked to turn it off.
After his outbursts made the headlines, the 30 Rock star later tweeted: “Let’s play a game called Mass Unfollowing. I want to crash this acct and start again. But, tonight at 10 PM, NY time, unfollow me.”
He then posted: “I leave you with this…. The great Bernard Haitnk and the Concertgebouw, performing the Mahler 9th, fourth movement” with a link to a YouTube video.
Visitors to Baldwin’s account are now told that it has been deactivated.
The troubled star has made the headlines with various controversies in the past, including a leaked voicemail in which he calls his 11-year-old daughter a “rude, thoughtless little pig” before adding: “You don’t have the brains or the decency as a human being.”
Baldwin apologised to passengers who had their flight delayed owing to the incident via the Huffington Post.
“It was never my intention to inconvenience anyone with my ‘issue’ with a certain flight attendant,” Baldwin wrote.
He went on to claim he had been “singled out” by an AA employee for using his phone to complete messages after the plane had closed its doors but was still waiting for take-off.
The deactivation of Baldwin’s account, together with Ashton Kutcher’s recent decision to hand his account over to his publicity team after he posted a series of ill-advised tweets, seems to be indicative of a growing trend for celebrities to court PR disaster by posting unvetted comments direct from their own brains (or lack thereof).
